Performance

Below is a performance comparison between NetSerializer and protobuf-net. Protobuf-net is a fast Protocol Buffers compatible serializer, which was the best serializer I could find out there when I considered the serializer for my use case.

The tests create an array of N items of particular type, created with random data. The items are then serialized, and this is repeated M times for the same dataset. NetSerializer can also serialize types directly, without writing any meta information or boxing of value types. These tests are marked with "(direct)".

The table lists the time it takes run the test, the number of GC collections (per generation) that happened during the test, and the size of the outputted serialized data (when available).

There are three tests:

• MemStream Serialize - serializes an array of objects to a memory stream.

• MemStream Deserialize - deserializes the stream created with MemStream Serialize test.

• NetTest - uses two threads, of which the first one serializes objects and sends them over a local socket, and the second one receive the data and deserialize the objects. Note that the size is not available for NetTest, as tracking the sent data is not trivial. However, the dataset is the same as with MemStream, an so is the size of the data.

The details of the tests can be found from the source code. The tests were run on a 64bit Windows 10 laptop.

100 LargeStruct x 30000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	526	91 0 0	1859
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	439	91 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	751	184 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	987	381 0 0	2151
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	1586	183 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	2151	566 0 0

100 LargeStruct x 30000 (direct)

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	463	0 0 0	1759
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	413	0 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	661	0 0 0

100 Guid x 50000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	733	101 0 0	1964
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	509	101 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	939	204 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	4487	890 0 0	2100
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	4503	279 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	5803	1178 0 0

100 Guid x 50000 (direct)

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	642	0 0 0	1876
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	499	0 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	819	0 0 0

100 Int32 x 100000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	617	152 0 0	461
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	426	152 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	742	306 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	8778	1527 0 0	648
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	9078	560 14 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	11416	2103 1 0

100 Int32 x 100000 (direct)

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	468	0 0 0	361
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	428	0 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	580	0 0 0

100 U8Message x 100000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	389	0 0 0	200
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	991	152 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	1137	152 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	3007	966 0 0	527
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	5745	152 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	6925	1122 0 0

100 U8Message x 100000 (direct)

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	281	0 0 0	100
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	1047	152 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	1156	152 0 0

100 S16Message x 100000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	512	0 0 0	341
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	1110	152 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	1347	152 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	3204	966 0 0	844
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	5986	152 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	7325	1122 0 0

100 S32Message x 100000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	593	0 0 0	461
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	1207	152 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	1475	152 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	3371	966 0 0	828
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	6066	152 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	7535	1120 0 0

100 S64Message x 100000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	699	0 0 0	542
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	1313	152 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	1603	152 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	3512	966 0 0	809
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	6268	152 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	7672	1124 0 0

100 DecimalMessage x 50000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	648	127 0 0	1360
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	934	101 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	1292	229 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	2716	610 0 0	2022
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	4220	101 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	5052	713 0 0

100 NullableDecimalMessage x 100000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	441	7 0 0	238
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	1156	254 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	1340	262 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	4033	973 0 0	353
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	6727	254 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	8203	1233 0 0

100 PrimitivesMessage x 10000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	703	25 0 0	5286
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	748	76 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	1010	102 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	725	96 0 0	7290
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	1089	50 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	1348	148 0 0

10 DictionaryMessage x 1000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	1310	75 0 0	86187
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	1955	109 54 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	2521	135 67 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	1713	413 0 0	142035
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	3576	233 116 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	4693	494 247 11

100 ComplexMessage x 10000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	410	0 0 0	2838
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	608	100 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	812	100 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	838	96 0 0	5087
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	1902	100 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	2195	198 0 0

100 StringMessage x 20000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	447	0 0 0	4886
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	655	182 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	903	182 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	1043	193 0 0	5085
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	3973	182 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	2428	378 0 0

100 StructMessage x 20000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	528	0 0 0	2455
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	681	117 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	909	117 0 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	1369	274 0 0	3622
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	4297	280 0 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	2752	557 0 0

100 BoxedPrimitivesMessage x 20000

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	708	0 0 0	1723
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	570	223 0 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	862	223 0 0

10000 ByteArrayMessage x 1

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	736	1 1 1	498085311
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	325	58 29 1
NetSerializer	NetTest	889	58 27 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	1329	341 6 3	498151945
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	418	58 29 1
protobuf-net	NetTest	1696	172 40 2

1000 IntArrayMessage x 1

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	1533	0 0 0	177278871
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	1147	2 1 0
NetSerializer	NetTest	1821	3 1 0
protobuf-net	MemStream Serialize	1849	79 4 2	283510795
protobuf-net	MemStream Deserialize	1720	28 3 0
protobuf-net	NetTest	2620	88 5 2

10 TriDimArrayCustomSerializersMessage x 100

		time (ms)	GC coll.	size (B)
NetSerializer	MemStream Serialize	1246	0 0 0	1601277
NetSerializer	MemStream Deserialize	1175	30 27 25
NetSerializer	NetTest	1844	43 41 38

As can be seen from the tests, NetSerializer is clearly faster and has smaller memory footprint in about all of the cases. For example, the tests with ComplexMessages show NetSerializer's MemStream Serialize cause zero garbage collections, even though more than 20MB of data is being serialized.